Wednesday, December 26, 2012

On December 9, 2012, Mexican-American singer Jenni Rivera perished, along
with her staff, in an air crash south of Monterrey, Mexico. This crash was
sudden and impacted many people in the Latin American community because of her
music and tragic circumstances. Because of the sudden and tragic circumstances
of this accident, many news sites and individuals in social media were
desperate for answers regarding her death. The rumours started swimming around
over the aircraft being sabotaged or shot down by cartel leaders in Mexico.
Others linked this accident to the politically charged incidents where two
Mexican Secretaries of State died in air crashes during the regime of president
Felipe Calderon. But two things did catch the attention of the individuals, the
pilot and the aircraft’s age.

Many individuals started berating the age of Ms. Rivera’s aircraft. Many
wondered why would anyone ride in an aircraft that is four decades old. There
are bloggers, which I will not name, that went on a rant on the fact that
Jenni's ill-fated aircraft was a 43 year old Learjet. And there are individuals
within the aviation community concerned about the age of the aircraft. An
article on CNN had an both sides of the story regarding the age of the
aircraft. But John McGraw, ex-deputy administrator of the Federal
Aviation Administration (FAA) stated, ‘However -- on its own -- age is not anindicator of an airplane's safety.’
I remember an adage stating that an aircraft can fly forever as long as you
give it proper maintenance. Many Learjets, especially the Learjet 35, have a
very long lifespan given by its manufacturer and can fly as long as it is
airworthy under FAA standards. Here are some examples of old flyable aircraft:

Clockwise from the left is a de Havilland Canada DHC-2 Beaver. This
aircraft was one of the first to fly precious cargo out to the wilderness of
Canada and Alaska. Lifelines relied on this aircraft to ferry cargo out to the
isolated settlements in these regions. Next is the Antonov 2. This is another
rugged aircraft that was used for everything, including, agricultural sprayer,
bomber, and special forces transport. This aircraft entered production in 1947
in the USSR and continues to fly today. The last aircraft in these images is a
DC-3. This aircraft was one of the first airliners (it was also the C-47, the
more famous transport of World War II including inserting the 101st airborne
into Northern Europe and flying cargo over the ‘hump’ in the Himalayas) in the
world. This aircraft continues to fly today for charter cargo companies and air
tours around the world. Here are a few military examples:

From clockwise on the left: the B-52 is one of the primary
bombers of the United States Air Force and has served the United States for 57
years. The Tupolev Tu-95 bomber is the Russian counterpart to the B-52 and also
survived many of its replacements in its 56 year of service. The problem with
older aircraft is that it becomes more expensive to repair due to lack of parts
(and rise of prices due to this) and more constant need for repairs. Most
of the military aircraft here are old but many of its vital components have
been replaced with newer parts. One cannot compare the age decay of an aircraft to that of an automobile.

The same thing goes for aircraft that survived an incident
or crash. Many aircraft suffer incidents throughout their life spans (such as
crumpled landing gear, damaged vertical stabilizer, uncontrollable exploding
engine, etc.) but can be deemed airworthy and repaired to flying condition.
This aircraft was involved in an incident in 2005. It is a vehicle like a car,
and it can be repaired to work again. One thing to note is that the nations
where popular aircraft reside have strict laws and standards in making an
aircraft. Redundancies in vital systems, high quality construction material, and
designs that are tried and true from experienced aircraft makers and,
tragically, lessons from air accidents. This results in sturdy and sometimes
rugged aircraft. The reason air crashes become prominent in the news is because
of the quick way an aircraft crashes into the Earth and the devastating
landscape of a crash site. And I cannot fathom how many times people would bat
an eye to headlines similar to ‘CAR RUNS OFF ROAD, ENTIRE FAMILY KILLED.’

As for the crash itself, it is too early to tell what
brought it down. A proper investigation required chemical analysis (to cross out
possibility of explosive or anti-air missile), analysis of aircraft parts to
look for possible metal fatigue, air traffic audio tapes and radar data (since
the aircraft did not carry an onboard data recorder), and all available maintenance
records and interviews of mechanics leading up to, at least, a year. Every
accident starts with everything being a possible cause and it is a tedious
detective work to sum it up to one or a few causes leading to the crash.

The preliminary data available suggests that the aircraft
suffered a loss of control at 28,000 feet. Now, an old aircraft works like any car. Each
one has its flying twitches and unique characteristics (like it slowly rolling
to the right as a car would slowly steer to the right in a straight road). This
is why it is good to have the same pilot flying the same aircraft as the pilot
is used to these characteristics and knows how to correct them in flight. The
aircraft could have possibly rolled to the left or right. Perhaps a turbulent
bump in the air exaggerated that flight characteristic, caught the pilot off
guard, and caused the aircraft to dive uncontrollably into the ground. I
honestly don’t know. I don’t have access to the flight records or investigation
data.

Here is an article from the Smithsonian Institute
regarding a plane’s age and how to check its airworthiness with nondestructive evaluation.

Here is a link (in Spanish) of a press release from the Secretary of
Communications and Transportation regarding the crash.